Irish Republican Brotherhood

The Irish Republican Brotherhood was a secret Irish patriotic society that existed from 1858 to 1924, bearing the goal of creating an independent democratic republic in Ireland that was free of British rule. The brotherhood's supporters, known as Fenians, cooperated with the America-based Fenian Brotherhood to fight for Irish independence, engaging in a failed 1867 uprising and in a terrorist dynamite campaign during the 1880s. In 1916, the IRB's largest revolt, the Easter Rising, was crushed by the British Army. In 1919, the IRB would start the Irish War of Independence, and it dissolved in 1924 after the establishment of the Irish Free State.